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Samantha Taylor, CZT, has been working with Sakura on a really adorable video that has just been released. A link to the video can be found at Laura Harms Diva site. This week’s challenge is to take inspiration from the video and do something from nature. In Laura’s words: Use colour to bring a Zentangle tile to life! Camouflage a bug somewhere in the tile. (i.e. a drawing of a bug, a bug-shaped tangle pattern, etc.) Create a tile inspired by nature! Shade your tile using some colour!

My Zia is 8 x 10 inches, drawn with micron 01 pen on a previously inked and sponged background piece of watercolor paper. Tangles used are Mumsy, Stoic, W2, Pokeroot, Flux, and Sindoo. I have done several ZIAs in the past using butterflies and Mumsy. I hope you like this one.

Have a great week, and don’t forget to go to Laura’s site to see all the art. Sakura is even having a give away on Laura’s site.

Wow! I can certainly say that this was a very interesting challenge. I learned a new word and a new style. When I started out, the word I would use to describe the process is “tedious”. Then I had a talk with myself, and I said: “Self! Slow down, breathe deeply, and don’t try to “draw” the dots, just place them on the paper in order.” The second one I did was much more zen-like. This still won’t be a style I’ll embrace, but I’m glad I persevered and made two tiles. It’s a good thing I was able to finally enjoy the process, because I can’t say too much for the product, lol!

The first one uses a number of tangles plus a butterfly and flower. The second one is a dotty Samson. As you can see, I’m also playing around with my chop. Up til now haven’t come up with one I really like. Maybe this one is it. We’ll see.

I’ve missed working on the challenges. It feels good to be back. Hope you all enjoy your week.

I’ve missed the Diva Challenges for several weeks now but I was determined to make time for this week. When I saw the challenge my first thought was “oh boy, a hard one”. Then I grabbed my camera and went around the house looking for border patterns. In just two rooms I found about a dozen. Here is the tile I did.

Here’s a collage of the borders I found, which includes the two that I used for this tile.

I used the upper left plate and part of the table leg. Now I’m off to look at the eye candy. I’ve missed the Diva and her challenges and hopefully I’ll be able to participate for a while.

This week’s challenge is Tipple , and according to Laura you either love it or hate it. In that case, I’m on the “love it” side of the equation. It is one of my favorite go-to tangles to fill odd spaces. This, however, is the first time I’ve ever started with tipple and built around it. Here’s what I came up with:

Tanglesl: Tipple, Printemps, Mooka, Pokeroot, Strircles, and Nipa

I was surprised when I finished to find that tipple ended up being a small part of the overall composition. Oh, well! tipple is wonderful, but it is a fill after all. Be sure to go to the Diva’s website and check out all the other submissions.

This week’s challenge from the Diva was a monotangle of Dex, a lovely pattern developed by Maria Thomas, co-founder of Zentangle®. I found this week’s challenge quite daunting. It wasn’t because the pattern is hard to draw. It’s actually fairly simple; especially if you start with a grid as the first step. My problem was in making an interesting tile using ONLY this tangle. My muse totally left me when I was trying to come up with tangleations. Plus, I cheated and looked at many of the entries and was totally blown away by the beauty and ingenuity displayed in some of the tiles. My favorites are the ones that are three-dimensional. If you go take a look, you’ll recognize them right away. However, I persevered to come up with something, and here it is:

On the first challenge of each month, Laura randomly picks a tangle submitted by one of us for our enjoyment. This month’s tangle is brought to us by Jane MacKugler, CZT, and is called Henna Drum. This is an easy to draw organic tangle, and here is my first one.

The only tangles I added to Henna Drum, which I auraed, are Flux and Zinger plus a few orbs “strategically” placed. I did use a string, but it disappears into the lines of Henna Drum which I drew over them. I think I’ll try another one, maybe with more contrast and drama, but for now this is it.

I love to read comments and hope you’ll leave me one. Until next time, Happy Tangling!

This week Erin added an extra challenge. We were asked to base the challenge on The Robert Louis Stevenson novella, “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” This is the story of a prominent doctor who has a split personality. His alter ego, Mr. Hyde, is a total opposite to Dr. Jekyll and is a murderer with no ethics or morals. Erin asked us to explore the concept of opposites this week in our zendala. The challenge this week is to split the template into two distinct sides, each the opposite in some way from the other. We are free to do that any way our artistic muse suggests.

I will admit that I had a bit of a problem getting going on this one. I think the reason is that part of the appeal of zendalas and/or mandalas for me is their symmetry. The symmetry speaks to me of peace, tranquility, order…..all things that are often absent in life. As a result, I wasn’t comfortable with total opposites in the tangles, so I chose to work with color. This worked out well since I had just received a new set of Glittery Gelly Role Pens. I chose green and red, opposites on the color wheel. The only problem I ran into was that when I copied it after finishing it; the green glitter looks very very blue. (The reason is that it is blue. I thought it was green in the light I was working in, but I was mistaken.) Oh, well. Here it is:

Tangles: Tipple, Sand Swirl

For any of you who did black on white and white on black (which appeals to me a lot) I have a question. How do you transfer the template onto black card stock??I know there is a white transfer paper that is used to transfer an image onto dark fabric. Is that what you use? I thought you had to use a transfer wheel to do that. I’m totally stuck, and I’m sure if anyone can enlighten me it will be a “Duh” moment, lol.

This week the Diva (Laura Harms) asked us all to use the same string. The string is #004; and was submitted by Sue Agnew. The string can be found here. I love string theory challenges, because it’s exciting to see how very different each of the drawings are; but all using the same string. Here’s my drawing on a 3.5″ official tile.

The tangles I used are Baton, Buttercup, Tipple, Hollibaugh, Bronx Cheer, ‘Nzeppel, Tipple, and Purk.

Don’t forget to visit the Diva’s website (link on the right) and thank you for stopping by and any comment you want to make.

Here is my entry for this week’s zendala dare from Erin at The Bright Owl. I had trouble getting away from the actual lines, so I finally decided to just go with the flow. There are so many design errors on this, that at first I wasn’t going to post it. Then I decided to try the Zentangle approach. I tried to look at the whole, and not the parts where I knew the mistakes were. It works! It’s drawn on a distressed ink background. Here it is:

The tangles I used are Baton, Pearlz; Allium variation with auras, and some line work and fill. Thanks for stopping by and any comment you want to make.

This week Erin gave us a template to use that I think is just gorgeous. It was drawn by Mariet, a regular contributor to the Zendala Dare. She used Genevieve Crabe templates which she won in a contest. Be sure to go look at the original blank template, over at The Bright Owl. Here is my first interpretation of the template

Tangles: Flux, Poke Leaf, Tipple

It’s a little busy, but it reminds me of a wreath. It would probably look good with color. I may just do that and add it to this post later. I have an idea for another one which I’ll do if I have time. For now this is it. Don’t forget to go over to Erin’s site and enter your drawings and/or look at all the beautiful eye-candy. Thanks to everyone who commented here recently, and I’d love to hear from you again.

Hugs;

Linda

P.S. I haven’t had time to do a second one yet, and I”m going on a mini-vacation to Victoria, BC; but I did color the one I already did. Which do you like better…..color or black and white. I personally vote for black and white.